Talk:Shade (3.5e Template)

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I can count hundreds of templates that simply make creatures better. Have you seen the Paragon template? There's nothing wrong with the concept (ie:Forgotten Realms). Think of how light-based spells would wreak havoc on a creature with this template. There are weaknesses to this template, more than I can say for many WoW published templates.

This template is just...what the hell? A ton of ridiculous abilities for no good reason. I don't see any reason they should have most of these abilities, if not all of them. They're made of shadowstuff so...why do they get better armor, a bonus to attack rolls, and fast healing again? Surgo 22:12, 23 June 2009 (MDT)

Is this template still considered imbalanced after the revision? Seems like some hefty penalties were added in. --reddir 21:12, 23 September 2009 (MDT)

I'm not sure they're particularly unbalanced at the moment. However the bit where Darkness and Shadow Jump cancel out their weaknesses to light means that their fire vulnerability is their main disadvantage. It seems to me that it would be more entertaining if Shades were best fought with torches and lamps, not with Fireball. --Foxwarrior 21:36, 23 September 2009 (MDT)

Would it be reasonable to change this to Light Vulnerability, 2x damage from spells with the Light descriptor? Perhaps, to model that fire gives off light, add regular SRD: Vulnerability to Energy (Fire)? --reddir 05:12, 26 September 2009 (MDT)

Perhaps something like: "While in bright light caused by a spell with the Light descriptor, you take damage of 1hp/round; additional sources of similar light do not stack. When in physical contact with an object emitting magical bright light, you take damage of 2hp/round." Would this work and fit the flavor better? --reddir 06:10, 26 September 2009 (MDT)

THe shade template in races of faerun is more my style, despite the LA. This is just weird--Name Violation 00:28, 24 September 2009 (MDT)

I don't understand the point in creating a new template. There is already a canon template available on page 147 of Races of Faerun. Use that.
--DrendDragonspawn 00:56, 18 November 2009

This template is really broken. You've only given the illusion of limitations. Any bright light limitations are negated by the fact that they can create darkness 2x/day. If that isn't enough they can control light, at will, and just in case that isn't enough, the have perfect flight, so even if it did bother them, they could just get away. Sure you have they take double damage from fire, but they also have innate Spell Resistance. 2*0 is still 0.

In the Skills section: "Also, while in lighting brighter than shadowy, a shade takes a -4 penalty to all Strength and Dexterity based Skill Checks."

Is this intended to be part of the Light Sensitivity Special Quality? Is it removed if/when the Shade is able to cast Wish or Miracle to remove Light Sensitivity? From another angle, does it still apply if the Shade is created at LA +3 without Light Sensitivity? --reddir 05:06, 26 September 2009 (MDT)

Hey, Thanks everyone. Once school slows down a bit, I'll find time to fix this up a but. I appreciate all the constructive feedback; I would never have thought of all this stuff up on my own. -Johnnya4344

This template strikes me as fairly balanced, but i'd reccomend at least making at +1 LA, with these changes. Here are my issues with it, and how i would change them

The Ex Abilities-
It has an oddly large amount of them. Even where it doesn't really make a lot of sense, game-wise. While i get the idea of the thing being able to use these extraordinarily because it's actually made of darkness, some of them would automatically merit a much higher LA. I'd change Flight and Shadow Jump to Su abilities. This would help to keep this at a low LA, which seems to be what you were going for. Invisibility, i would change to a 3/day spell-like. Being able to cast that one per round, as an undispellable Su ability would immediately pump up the LA. Even duergar can't do that, and they're a LA one base race.

Darkvision, Spell Resistance, and Fast Healing-
In both the Shadow Creature(Lords of Madness, page 168) and the Shade (Races of Faerun, page 147), the Fast Healing is set at 2. Shade isn't really meant to be used by a PC, but Shadow Creature is. I like the idea of Fast Healing that scales with level, and only works in shadowy or darker, but at least consider setting it at a solid 2. The darkvision is extremely appropriate, but consider making it enhanced darkvision, able to see through even magical darkness, similar to a devil. The See In Darkness(Su) ability is described in the Devil entry of the Monster Manual. This would counterbalance the fact that it gets Darkness, which it normally wouldn't be able to see through. The spell resistance, if my memory serves, is as a Drow. It's appropriate.

Flight, Shadow Jump, and Control Light-
Perfect flight at your land speed, along with a 150% increase in that land speed, is...odd. As is said in the entry, the best flight speed it's even possible to have as a human is 45. I suppose this is appropriate. Personally speaking, i would have make some kind of Su ability that mimicked Gaseous Form. Shadow Jump seems a little overcomplicated-consider just making it the equivalent of a Dimension Door.

Control Light is confusing at best. Even in the original Shade entry, it isn't exactly clear-cut what it does. It reduces sight, and grants a Hide bonus. Does it also reduce the light level? If you want to simplify this, just give them Darkness as a Su ability instead of a Sp.

The Weaknesses-
Light Sensitivity helps to offset a lot of the powers of this class, but it's been said before- this is sort of just the illusion of a weakness. A good balance for this? NONE of the special qualities function in anything above Shadowy illumination. And you take all the penalties associated with Light Sensitivity. That cements the similarity to both the Shadow and Shade templates. The Fire Vulnerability makes sense to me. I like the Caster Level reduction quite a bit-it adds to the mechanic.

The abilty score adjustments seem a little...iffy. Offset by the Light Sensitivity, i have no problem.

The real issue comes with the ability to Wish away the sensitivity. The XP cost for that, to me, seems very, very steep. I'd either remove the ability to wish it away, period, and have to make it without it at the beginning, or adjust the XP cost. I like the idea of being able to make it without LS in the beginning for a reasonable +3 LA, but a +5 LA for no Fire Vulnerability is silly. The actual Shade template, which is much, much more powerful than this, only imposes a +4 LA. Remove the ability to make one without Fire Vulnerability.

Overall- Probably one of the better templates on dandwiki. Great work!